In The News

Pakistan, Taliban and Global Security – Part I

Leonard S. Spector May 8, 2009
With the Pakistani army battling Islamist insurgents barely 100 miles from the capital, the world’s wary eyes are turned increasingly on the safety of the country's nuclear arsenal. In the first of our two part series on Pakistan and global security, non-proliferation expert Leonard Spector outlines the danger that the Taliban poses to Pakistan's nuclear assets. Spector shows that the...

Tactics in a Cosmic War

Reza Aslan April 22, 2009
Former President Bush made a grave error when casting the “war on terror” as a “crusade,” according to Reza Aslan, author of “How to Win a Cosmic War: God, Globalization, and the End of the War on Terror.” By relying on distinctively religious rhetoric, Bush played into the jihadists' hands: that of conflating the war on terror with a war on Islam. President Obama has reversed such a stance...

Obama’s Afghanistan-Pakistan Quandary – Part I

Ashley J. Tellis April 13, 2009
During the long election campaign, then candidate Barack Obama criticized President George W. Bush for dropping the ball in Afghanistan to devote military resources to Iraq. Now President Obama is trying to find the right course in Afghanistan. In the first of this two part YaleGlobal series, Carnegie Endowment scholar Ashley J. Tellis writes that President Obama’s decision to continue the fight...

Pakistan: The Militant Jihadi Challenge

March 30, 2009
As the US and NATO prepare to step up military action to blunt extremism along the Afghanistan-Pakistan border, the International Crisis Group presents analysis on the extent of the challenge: “that the Pakistani Taliban is an outgrowth of radical Sunni networks in the country’s political heartland is too often neglected.” Extremist networks provide weapons, recruits and financing for attacks on...

Afghan Strikes by Taliban Get Pakistan Help, US Aides Say

Mark Mazzetti March 27, 2009
Trusting an alliance with divided allegiances is difficult, if not impossible. Pakistan is a US ally in the fight to control Afghanistan, but evidence has emerged that Pakistani military intelligence operatives provide support for Taliban attacks on foreign troops. “The support consists of money, military supplies and strategic planning guidance to Taliban commanders who are gearing up to...

The Downside of Letting Robots Do the Bombing

Mark Mazzetti March 26, 2009
Washington is mulling the long-term implications of using drone robots – missiles attached to remote-controlled planes – to kill enemies in combat, reports Mark Mazzetti for the New York Times. The drones attack Al Qaeda leaders hiding in remote regions of Pakistan without endangering US troops, Mazzetti writes, yet are “the antithesis of the grinding, patient and high-risk counterinsurgency...

Democracy May be the Best Ally Against Pakistan's Extremists

Paula R. Newberg March 20, 2009
Pakistan confronts many challenges, on governance, extremism and a war in neighboring Afghanistan that encroaches its own borders. An international focus on eliminating terrorism led to agreements with Pakistani presidents that often bypassed courts and parliament. And that may be an important reason why the Pakistani people pressed for the release of Supreme Court Chief Justice Iftikhar...